Don't shoot me!

Sorry, y'all, I know it's been FOREVER since I posted! I have high hopes of posting a ton of things once we get back home to Chas. but we'll have to see...may just have to post the highlight pix and then get to AJ coming home...I don't forsee me having any free time really before then...or while he's on leave! We'll be busy being a family again!

So anyway, all that as a long rambling way of saying I'm sorry, and I'll post Thanksgiving/Christmas/TX visit pix when I have time.

Sam is 8 Months Old!

Sam is:

• crawling
• pulling up
• has eaten (in no particular order) peas, green beans, mixed veggies of different sorts, carrots, sweet potatoes, jar and homemade, bananas, jar and "homemade," peaches, apples/applesauce, strawberries, pears, yogurt, plums, grapes (in a mixed fruit jar), squash, butternut and acorn, corn, avacados, oatmeal, rice cereal, and mixed cereal, refried beans, breads of various sorts (he generally still chokes on these, though...), puffs, yogurt melts, cheerios (choked on them, too, so he doesn't get them anymore), and some bites of a cheesy turkey and rice casserole from my mom the other night when he was begging (he didn't get any turkey, just sauce and rice).
• says "hi", "hey", "yay", "didi" (pronounced diedie, meaning Daddy), dada (meaning mommy), and baba (meaning almost anything, including brother).
• can sign more, and knows what the sign for milk means
• is growing more tufts of hair on the top of his head
• has 6 teeth, 4 on top, 2 on bottom, and has puffy places on top where his canines and molars are, and slightly puffy on bottom where the secondary incisors are.
• loves to smile and make people laugh and be silly with him
• crawls around growling all the time
• loves to knock over his brother's block buildings
• loves to chew on things
• is absolutely ADORABLE!!
• LOVES any kind of electronic device, especially laptop computers!
• can move at lightning speed when moving toward laptops that have been unwisely left on the floor w/in reach of a Sam.
• knows his daddy, but thinks he lives in the computer
• wants to eat any "grown up" food in sight, but usually chokes on it
• weighs more than he did, but i have no idea how much

Sam with Uncle Nate...Uncle Nate REALLY loved playing and snuggling with Sam!
If his binky was moved, maybe you could see the resemblance b/t him and that dino w/ all the teeth on his shirt!
Playing in the leaves
Grabbing Aunt Missy's nose, one of his favorite pastimes!

He's such a fun, cute, full-of-personality little boy, and I loveLoveLOVE him!!!

Holiday in the Park Fun Run!

One of the county parks in Chas. (on James' Island) has an annual Christmas light display throughout the whole park. We went last year and drove through it (and walked through parts, too). This year, not being pregnant, I signed up for the Fun Run/Walk on the opening night of the event. We didn't run mostly, and ended up coming in dead last, but it was fun with the kids. Here are some pix of the event and the kids at home in their cute outfits after we got home that night. WARNING: There are a LOT of pix!

"Look this way, Sam."
Silly brothers
Big brother and little brother Santa socks
Both of them looking at the camera at the same time!!
Crawling Sam
Isn't he adorable! So handsome in his Christmas sweater and fleece lined jeans (it was COLD that night!)
Eating the roasted marshmallows
Roasting the marshmallows
The PIG (Piggly Wiggly mascot) was at the finish line to greet us (there was a bus rounding up stragglers...ie, us). Josh thought he was cool, the rest of the kids were pretty scared of him.
Mr. wind

Nativity
Josh had fun...loved his glow sticks (or as he calls them, gluesticks!)
The new charleston bridge
HUGE oak tree w/ icicle lights and a yellow ribbon
Kenzie and Sydney are good friends...but Josh was a little jealous...he wanted to hold hands with Sydney, too, but she was interested in girl time.
He was so interested in examining the lights that i couldn't get him to look at the camera.
The fire breathing sea serpent
Pretty holly wreath
Sam all bundled up (and incidentally, representing our awesome TEXANS!! Josh was doing his part, too!)
HUGE sand sculpture...they have a different one every year.
3 kids out of 6, in 2 out of 4 strollers
a gingerbread house

The squadron on TV

So the NFL did their Sunday show in Afghanistan, and they got to go on an airdrop mission. Guess who flew them? Yep, our squadron, the 17th AS Charleston! Our commander and one of the loadmasters were interviewed. AJ, of course, was no where near there, b/c he's not with the squadron, but these are some of his squadron mates.

Here's the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bi3pywup0Ls

Enjoy!

Attempting to get Sam to do something on video...

So Sam had been scooting after Rachel till I got the camera out. Oh, well, I tried...I'll try again! The second one is Sam "dancing" which he does all the time!

Pokins!!

That's what Josh calls them. We decided not to carve our pumpkins. Josh really wanted to "open" them, but I told him we could paint his pumpkin instead. He told me he wanted to make a blue bird. Here is the result:

Not bad for a 3 year old!
He loved painting the newspapers!

The blue sucker...started out blue, didn't get painted!
The process...notice his tongue out in concentration
My beautiful little punkin! I placed him by the pumpkins, but did no other posing for these...he's just perfect!
Channeling Daddy...look at that one eyebrow up! Have you ever seen a baby do that? I haven't!




No idea what he's looking at here, but doesn't he look angelic?


Investigating

Taking a closer look





My favorite photo...my precious little pumkin baby!